The Road to Enchantment by Kaya McLaren

Author:Kaya McLaren
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: St. Martin's Press

38

“I’ll be right back,” my mother had said, darting into a shop that sold local goods. She had come to Santa Fe to explore the possibility of different stores carrying her wine, which I thought was a little premature being that we had only brought in a tiny harvest that year and at the very least, it needed two years to age. I found my mother’s pitches embarrassing, and asked whether I could wander around the plaza instead.

At first, I heard only fragments of a few isolated notes, but something about their tone called to me, so I jumped off of the sidewalk where local Pueblo and Navajo artists sat on lawn chairs and sold their silver and turquoise jewelry on colorful blankets. Normally, I paused to admire the “needlepoint” style of the Zuni jewelers, appreciating the delicateness of their work. But on that day, I looked in the other direction, toward the plaza. In the sky above, the trees that grew there were two small clouds shaped like songbirds. I had not encountered clouds like those before, but had a vague positive feeling about them.

I crossed the street and entered the park, following the rich sound of the music. At the American Indian War Memorial sat a woman playing the cello, notes as low and sad as I felt. Each one resonated deep in my chest. The notes had been strung together so that the sadness had transformed into something beautiful and whole, something that made sense, something people could hear and understand. All of it welled up inside of me—my fears, my frustrations, my endless loneliness in all the places Darrel did not inhabit … even the degree of loneliness I still felt when I was with him. The notes stretched on like each interminable day I had experienced since moving to Monero … slow … slow like wind erosion. The cello was like one lonely voice. Finally, my soul had a song. I felt my face involuntarily contort, and knowing that something was happening that I could not stop, I closed my eyes so the world could not see my soul break open. Still, I felt the chill of tears streaking down my cheeks in the slight breeze.

“Well, that was fast,” my mother’s discouraged voice said from behind me. “They don’t have a liquor license so they can’t sell wine.”

Of course. Of course my mother would talk over the music of my soul so that it could not be heard. Of course she would show no reverence for its beauty, or give any indication that she’d heard it at all. I would have expected nothing less. I turned and looked at her, opening my eyes, revealing my experience.

“What’s wrong?” she asked, concerned.

“Nothing. I just love this music,” I answered.

After a short pause, Mom asked, “Are you premenstrual?”

I shook my head in exasperation. “Jesus, Mom. Are you that incapable of listening?”

I turned my attention back to the cellist, whose long gray hair seemed to reflect what I heard

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